


Five Weeks On

by chockymousse



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Gen, Interspecies Awkwardness, Interspecies Relationship(s), Interspecies Romance, Intimacy, Slow Burn, amputation recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-26 14:54:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14404464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chockymousse/pseuds/chockymousse
Summary: The weeks following the final stand against the Reapers told from the hospital bound view point of a would-be nurse and the injured turian soldier who comes her way.





	1. Week One

**Author's Note:**

> Vignettes with a bit of a plot, written for a friend who recently finished the Trilogy; I hope she likes it.

** LONDON **

CLARE

It was during the first week of the aftermath that Clare stumbled into the _other_ part of the hospital.  She was on her way out, her second “official” shift now over, and she got more than a little lost on her way through the crumbling corridors.  She pushed open the door to a large, well lit room.

A quarian stepped immediately in front of her, “Yes?” she said, her mechanically twinged voice was terse.

“Oh!  Um.  Hi.  Sorry.  I was just –“ Clare looked past the quarian to the room filled with beds.  Beds occupied mostly with injured turians with a quarian or three thrown in for good measure.  The air was thick with the scent of what had to be dextro blood.  “Where’s everyone else?”

The quarian tilted her head to the side, “You were expecting something more?”

“There’s more than 20 injured in here, where are your other doctors?  Nurses?  Surgeons?”

“We have a surgeon,” the quarian said slowly, obviously unsure if the human in front of her was mocking her, “He’s sleeping.  I sent him away; he’s been working these past three days without a break.”

“Let me help,” Clare blurted, already slipping the strings of her soiled apron back around her neck.

The quarian looked her up and down and began to shake her head, “Thank you,” she told her coldly, “but no.  We look after our own kind here.”

“With all due respect, it doesn’t look like you can afford to turn me away.  There has to be something I can do.”

Clare looked around the room, her eyes lighting on some unmade beds at the far end of the room.  The quarian followed her gaze.

“You can make the beds, but get rid of that apron.  And disinfect your hands.  And arms.  And then gloves – over there in the cupboard.  You’re on the dextro ward, now, …?”

“Clare.”

“Clare.  I am Rinna’Shisa vas Ginil.  Our surgeon is a turian called Favius; you’ll meet him later.  If you’re still here.”

Rinna turned and headed back to a moaning quarian in the bed behind her.  Clare did as she was told.

**

Clare was exhausted.  Prior to stumbling onto the dextro ward she had worked a standard twelve hour shift as a supply runner come meal preparer on the ward at Waterloo Bridge.  Mostly she had just felt as though she was in the way – there was a surprising amount of down time considering how dire the situation was.  The humans needed volunteers in the hospitals, yes, but they had the luxury of being able to pick and choose from skilled workers.  Having worked an office job prior to the reaper invasion, Clare’s skills weren’t exactly in high demand when it came to frontline duties, and she had been relegated to the position of helper.

With Rinna, though, she was the _only_ helper.  Though the quarian wouldn’t let her touch a patient, she had Clare running all over sourcing materials, making beds, and washing up.  There was a lot of washing up.  It didn’t look like a single instrument had been cleaned since the battle began.  She let her mind go blank as she worked until the sound of agonised subvocals cut through the monotony of disinfecting bedpans.

Through the door came an older turian, who Clare correctly identified as Favius, came hurrying in.  He wasn’t alone.  Two other turians, soldiers, and the surgeon had – between them – carried in a third turian soldier.  The third was badly wounded if the angle of his leg dangling off his body was anything to go by.

 “What can I do?” she asked, a little breathless at the thought of actually being able to actively help someone.

“Who’s this?” growled Favius, doing his best to place the injured turian on the bed as gently as possible.  The white sheets were stained blue with blood almost immediately.

“A volunteer,” Rinna answered, arriving at the bedside with a portable surgical screen which she placed over the turian’s middle.

Favius looked Clare up and down and grunted, obviously satisfied with her gloved, gowned, and masked presence.  The remaining soldiers flicked their mandibles warily.

“Okay,” Favius started, “Rinna – by my side.  You two, you might need to hold him down.  And you –“ he said, pointing at Claire with a taloned finger, “up there, by his head.  Distract him.  We have to get to work.”

Clare swallowed and tried to say something, anything, but she was shooed out of the way and moved through the huddle of bodies to sit by the turian’s head.  She glanced across at him, saw the way he was breathing – shallow and quick – and shook her head.

“I’m sorry,” she told him through her mask, “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

“I think you’re supposed to hold my hand,” his mandible twitched, “distract me while they remove my leg.”

Her jaw dropped a little and she glanced over at the screen but could see only four lowered heads and hear a murmured conversation.  She looked back at the turian and saw he was offering her his hand, palm up.  Clare quickly hooked a finger under the string of her mask to remove it, then did the same with her latex gloves, and carefully slipped her hand into his; pulling it over into her lap.  Physical contact is what was needed right now, not some plastic covered stranger.  He winced, as only a turian could; mandibles pulling tight to his face, subvocals vibrating.  He shook his head, “Not you.  Whatever they’re doing, it doesn’t feel great.”

Clare laughed nervously and squeezed his hand.  “I’m Clare, and you?”

He hissed in pain and his mandibles flared and revealed his too many, too sharp, teeth.  She had never been this close to a turian before.  Not even during the evacuations.  His hand gripped hers.  “Tertius.”

“Nice to meet you,” she told him softly, not noticing the almost incredulous look her gave her, “and are you from Palaven?  That’s the turian homeworld, right?  Did I pronounce it right?  I never know if it’s PAL-uh-van or Puh-LAH-van.”

He actually laughed.  Or she thinks he did.  His amber eyes were fixed on her face and his left mandible twitched along with a kind of vibration in his throat.  “Yes, I’m from Palaven.  A small town on the outskirts of the capital.”

“Cipritine,” she supplied,

“Yes,” he agreed, surprise temporarily lifting the timbre of his vocals, “when I was –“

But she never found out what he was.  There was a sickening noise – a drilling kind of noise – followed by a cracking, squelching kind of noise – and then she almost couldn’t feel her hand anymore, he was gripping it so tightly.  Tertius was breathing heavily through his nose, eyes closed, as he laid back on the bed.  She looked down at their linked hands, her fingers so white and tiny against his.  She put her other hand over his and stroked his warm, leathery skin.  She rubbed her thumb over his knuckles and let her fingers play in the soft spaces between his.

Clare noticed one of the soldiers who brought Tertius in had left the room, and the other was staring resolutely at the opposite wall.  If Tertius hadn’t moved yet, she doubted he would be moving now.  He moaned, a pitiful and vibratory sound, his eyes shut tight.  Clare saw the surgeon place a hand on his good leg, and Favius spoke to his patient for the first time since beginning the procedure,

“There, lad, you’re doing just fine.  This part’s almost over.  Just hang on a few minutes more and we’ll get you off to sleep.”

Tertius groaned again in reply, clearly whatever meds they had given him in the field weren’t doing a very good job.  Clare squeezed his hand between hers.  If it was all she could do, she was going to do her job and distract or comfort the poor guy as well as she could.

They finished bandaging up Tertius’ leg, and the surgeon left them with a grim nod.  Rinna excused herself for a moment and returned with an injection filled with some kind of sedative.  She spoke softly to Tertius through her helmet, explaining the procedure that was performed and the sedative she was about to inject into his body.  He offered up the soft, underside of his left arm and let her get on with it.

The grip on Clare’s hand loosened as Tertius released her.  She flexed her fingers under his and he turned his head to face her, “Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” she told him, “if I was any help at all, I’m just glad I could be here.”

His eyes were beginning to struggle to focus, “Thank you.  I’m not too proud to say I found comfort in a human’s presence.”

She smiled and let out a shuddering breath, “Good.”

Tertius blinked slowly.  Once.  Twice.

Clare placed his hand on his chest and let him sleep.

**

TERTIUS

She was there when he woke up the next day.  Not _there_ by his bedside, but _there_ on the other side of the room with the quarian doctor who had assisted on his surgery.  The doctor was doing something that required gauze and forceps, and Clare was the one to supply those necessities, standing resolutely by the doctor’s side.  Tertius shifted in his bed, the pain in his leg that had woken him was more than just discomfort now.  He really hoped they hadn’t run out of pain meds like his platoon medic had.

When Clare looked up from her patient, he caught her eye.  He saw her bend to speak to the quarian, who nodded but didn’t look up from her work.  Clare removed her mask on her way over.

“Hi,” she told him,

He tried to sit up, “Hello.  I, uh, I know you’re busy but, well, these beds weren’t exactly made for turians.”

Clare frowned, “Sorry, I don’t –“

“Right.  I’ve been lying in this same position for hours. I was hoping you could help me…”

“You want me to roll you over?”

His left mandible twitched, “I suppose that’s what I’m asking, yes.  Looks like I lost my dignity along with my leg.”

“Okay,” she told him, slowly taking in his body in its current position and wondering where on Earth she should even start, “tell me what I need to know about handling a turian.”

Tertius’ brow plates shifted and both his mandibles twitched, “Handling a turian?”

“That’s not what I meant,” she told him hurriedly, “and you know it.  Now, do you want help, or not?”

His subvocals hummed in amusement, “My apologies.  So, regarding my… handling…”  Clare narrowed her eyes.

Together they got Tertius on his side and, with his further direction, padded with pillows in all the necessary places.  There was one under his remaining leg spur, one to prop up whatever was left of his left leg, one under his hip, one behind his shoulder, and one almost inside his cowl.  Clare stood back to admire the product of their efforts.

“Comfortable?”

“I’ve felt better but yes, thank you.”

“Good.  Anything else?”

He regarded her, saw her struggle to keep her face impassive, “I look kind of stupid, don’t I?”

Her face lit up in amusement, “Just a little.  It looks comfy though – your own little pillow fort.”

His brow plates shift again as he locked his eyes on hers.  She watched him trying to figure her out.

Eventually he spoke again, “Pillow fort.  I like that.”

**

CLARE

Clare returned to the dextro ward every day after that.  She tried explaining her position to the volunteer liaison on the human ward, but they didn’t understand.  They told her they needed every man, woman and child who could spare their time, that every volunteer was doing vital work for the human race – and while Clare agreed, mostly, with what the coordinator had to say… when she considered the numbers, they just didn’t add up.  The humans had enforced breaks, and rosters, and shifts, and _volunteer liaisons_  who managed the whole process.  For the others, their wounded far outnumbered their able bodies.  Their effort was nowhere near as coordinated.  Clare didn’t even know how many makeshift dextro wards there were in London.  The simple fact of the matter was that she could do much more good for the quarians and the turians than she could for the humans.

“So.  Tertius.” Clare said, sitting awkwardly beside him.  He turned his head to face her, head tilted in question.  Clare couldn’t help thinking how much easier this part of her day was with patients who couldn’t – or wouldn’t – speak to her.  Most of the time, when the ward was quiet, she could just sit with someone, offer comfort purely through her presence.  She and Tertius now had something of a rapport though and that made things harder.

“Is it a family name?  I mean, stupid question really, but are you the third… something?”  She trailed off lamely.  Day three and already she was running out of small talk with the aliens.

Tertius relaxed his head back against the pillow, his fringe brushing over the edge.  “I’m the youngest of three.  My sisters are Prima and Seconda.”  He snorted, “My parents liked the classics, I guess.”

Clare smiled, “Sisters?”

“Sisters,” he agreed, some emotion in his subvocals she couldn’t place,

She nodded her encouragement and hoped he would continue.  He didn’t.  She picked up the slack.

“Your parents holding out for a boy, were they?”

Tertius shook his head, “No, that must be a human thing.  Both my parents were only children; I think they didn’t want us to be alone.”

"That's a nice sentiment," she told him,

“We’re close,” he continued, almost as if to himself, “a family of engineers.  Civil, mostly, since I’m the only one left serving in the military.  Dad’s so proud to have us take after him.”

Clare ignored the lump in her throat, “My family is in Australia, on the other side of the planet – you’d probably like it, actually, up in the tropics.  I imagine it might be something like Palaven.  Anyway, my brother just started a new job.  We’re a family of office workers.”

And whatever he had been about to say, Tertius was surprised enough to ask, “You’re not a nurse?”

That elicited a laugh from her, “I’m not.  You think I’m doing an okay job?”

“You fooled me,” he told her.

She smiled, “But you didn’t know any better.”

Tertius frowned, a shifting of his brow plates, his mandibles tight across his face, “Are you – how are you doing?  With your family so far away…”

She didn’t need to ask what he meant.  “I’m okay.  It’s hard, but I’m keeping busy.  That’s all anyone can do right now, I guess.”

Tertius opened his mouth and closed it again, shaking his head slightly. “That’s good,” he told her slowly, “I’m glad.”


	2. Week Two

TERTIUS

The next day she was already sitting next to his bed when he awoke.  He had slept very little the night before, thanks to his leg.  It wasn’t just pain he felt now, but a full, bruised feeling that was accompanied by a persistent, almost internal, itching.  They assured him he was healing up just fine, but it was hard to believe it sometimes, when three a.m hit and you were cold and uncomfortable, and not a little homesick.  Thankfully someone had shot him full of sedatives some time before sunrise.

 “Oh, Jesus,” she was saying, a furious whisper he wasn’t even sure was meant for him, “oh, God, what if I never find out what happened to them.  What if they never find out I’m okay.  Shit, I was doing so well.”  He heard her take a ragged breath, then, “It’s okay.  You’re okay.  You’re alive.  You’re helping people.  You’re doing just fine.”

She didn’t sound fine.  He wanted to be there for her like she had been for him, but he didn’t know how welcome his kind of comfort would be.  Not when she was longing for her own people.  His touch would only serve to remind her of how much she’d lost.  She took a few shallow sounding breaths and he stayed silent.  Minutes ticked by and he had almost drifted back off to sleep when,

“But I’m glad I met you.  You know, despite everything.  And your leg.  Obviously, it would be better if you still had your leg.  Oh, God, I’m glad you’re not awake to hear all this.”

It took all the self control Tertius possessed not to smile at that.  His mandible twitched anyway.  He had no idea whether she saw or not.

“Anyway, I’ll um, I’ll come by later when you’re actually awake.”

She laid a hand on his shoulder in goodbye.  He could feel it even after she’d left.

**

CLARE

Later, after her mini meltdown by his bedside, Tertius had one of his own.  Two of his squadmates, the ones who had brought him into the ward in the first place, had come by to visit him.  She didn’t hear the whole thing.  They were talking for a while, and for most of that time she was sat at a quarian’s bedside listening to _him_ speak – and any other time she would have been more than interested.  But when she heard Tertius’ voice raise, her already divided attention was pulled from the patient in front of her.

“Excuse me,” she told the quarian, “I need a glass of water.  Can I get you anything?”

The quarian waved her off and she walked quietly through the room past Tertius’ bed.

“Lucky?  You think I’m lucky to be in here?  With no news from the outside and only strangers for company?”

“Tertius,” it was the female, “you know what Quinus meant.”

He scoffed, “He seems to have forgotten this isn’t shore leave.  I lost my leg, Vera, not my mind.”

“We were there.  We were the ones who came looking for you, who dug you out of the rubble.  Don’t you dare tell me we’ve forgotten.”

“I’m sorry, Tertius.”  Quinus sounded uncomfortable, “I only meant, well, no, maybe I did mean you were lucky.  You’re lucky that you don’t have to see all the suffering out there.  At least in here you’re shielded from all that.  You can heal in peace.”

Clare heard a sigh, “You’re right.  In here, your world becomes very small.  I – thank you for coming.  Both of you.  And for the rations, too.”

Clare smiled at his reluctant acceptance.  She pushed away the thought that she was keeping her own world small on purpose.  She was about to move on when Vera spoke again.

“Are you going to be okay, Tertius?”

“I’ll be fine.  Don’t worry about me.  Please.”

“I hate to keep bringing this up, but you did lose your leg.”

“Vera, I –“

“Stop playing it off as some kind of minor flesh wound.  This is serious.”

Clare thought she was in for another argument but instead, Tertius’ voice was low and steady when he spoke, “I know.  It’s not ideal but I’m not stupid, I know I’m lucky to be alive.  And with so many people having given their lives to stand against the reapers, well, I think I got off lightly.”

Silence for a moment, then, Quinus, “Spirits, Tertius.  That’s one Hell of a rationalisation.”

“Agreed,” said Vera, “you might want to rethink your earlier comment.  Have your brain scanned while you’re here, you might have lost your mind after all.”

Tertius laughed, “Really, though, I’m in good hands here.  And they tell me I’m healing well.  Just keep your eyes peeled for some kind of prosthetic.  I’m going to need to be able to stand on my own two feet if I want to be any use in the clean up effort.”

Their conversation returned to safer topics, and Clare returned to her quarian patient.  She smiled, “So, where we we?”

**

CLARE

Clare was just coming back in from a supply run when Rinna caught her.  “You’re needed at bed six,” was all she said.  Clare walked over and saw the surgical screen and giant portable light shining brightly over Tertius’ bed.

“Everything okay?  Rinna said you needed me.”

Favius looked up at her from his position at the foot of the bed, “It’s time to change our lad’s dressing and have a look at how everything’s healing up.  He could do with a distraction.”

Clare nodded and took her place by Tertius’ head, “Hey,” she told him softly, finding his hand clenched next to his thigh and placing her hand over the top.  She ran her thumb over his knuckles, “Hey, you’re going to be okay.”

He nodded jerkily at her and then turned to the surgeon, “Okay doc, I guess there’s no point in putting it off any longer.”

Favius nodded back, “I won’t lie to you, son, this is going to hurt.”

Tertius let out a breath, “Yeah, you might have mentioned that once or twice.”

Clare couldn’t help smiling, though she fought it, and Tertius glanced over at her with a flick of his mandible.  The surgeon hummed and muttered something that sounded like, “You’d better hold on to something.”  Clare gripped Tertius’ hand tighter in response.  In preparation.

Nothing could have prepared her.

She couldn’t see what the surgeon was doing, but she saw Tertius react.  His whole body went rigid and he pressed himself both further into and away from the mattress he was laying on.  Clare had a vision of mandibles, and teeth, and heard a deep, vibratory growl, and then the surgeon was yelling at her to keep him distracted, to keep him still.

“If you don’t,” continued Favius, “it’s just going to make it worse on him later on.  I’ve got necrotic tissue down here that needs removing, and nerves I’d like to keep intact.  His _and_ mine.”

Clare nodded, “Got it, sorry,” she assured him, and stood, turning to Tertius.  She brought his fist up to the bottom of his carapace and held it there, “Tertius – look at me.  Just look at me… listen to my voice.  There’s nothing in this room right now except you and me, you with me?”

There were those eyes again, locked on hers, trying to figure out… something.  Right now she was just happy to have diverted his thoughts.  He was still breathing heavily, she could see his keel bone moving beneath the sheet, and feel his breath on her hand.  And now what?  She wondered, they could hardly go on staring at each other forever.  She swallowed.  She tried and failed to ignore the horrible scraping sound and smell of rotting flesh that were making themselves known.

In an effort to distract them both, she went to rearrange the pillow under his head that had become dislodged through his fidgeting.  She spoke softly to him the whole time, telling him what she was doing, asking him to bring his head up, letting him know when he could lay it back down.  His eyes were closed and she watched his head fall back against the pillow.  She rearranged it under his crest and her fingers brushed the ridged hide at the back of his head.  Tertius hummed and leaned into her touch.  Clare was shocked, but did it again, running her fingers back and forth under his crest as she would behind a dog’s ears. He seemed to like it, anyway.


	3. Week Three

TERTIUS

He thought he could do this, really, he did, but the pain in his leg was becoming too much.  He’d been lying there in pain for hours, grinding his teeth, willing himself to get through it – and he nearly did.  He might have, if Clare hadn’t come by before she left.

“Hey, I’m going,” she said quietly, seeing he was awake, but not wanting to disturb those around him, “need anything before I go?”

He knew he could play the inscrutable turian and hide his pain from her thanks to the plates on his face, but he also knew he was too far gone to quiet the strained thrumming of his subvocals. 

“Tertius?”

 “I’m fine.  It’s just my leg.”

“You’re in pain.  Let me get you something.”

“No, I can do this.  I’ve had enough pain killers these past couple of weeks.”  Clare bit her lip, clearly unsure of what to do.  He sighed, “I’m sorry.”

He watched Clare slip her handbag off her shoulder and kick it under the chair by his bedside.  She sat down, scooted forward, and linked her fingers with his.  Forearm to forearm, palm to palm, she sat with him in silence until he was worn out from the pain and fell into a fitful sleep.

**

CLARE

So it was that after two weeks of brutal eighteen hour shifts, Rinna sat her down for a chat.

“Clare.”

A pause.  Clare was uncomfortable.  Even after so many hours working alongside, and helping, quarians she still found it difficult to feel like she was engaging with the person inside the suit.  “Rinna.”

“I admit when you first walked in here, I thought you were lost.”

“I was.”

“But you were willing.  To help.  To sacrifice your time.  To put my people, and the turians, before your own.”

“Well, you needed help.”  Clare could see her input wasn’t really needed, but the quarian would keep pausing awkwardly between sentences.

Rinna nodded, “Certainly.  Between Favius and myself we were only barely managing.  With your help, we had supplies, freshly made beds, _clean instruments_ and an extra pair of hands.  Thank you.”

Clare nodded and waited for the other shoe to drop, her mouth suddenly dry.  Rinna couldn’t turn her away.  She wouldn’t.

“I have recruited a couple of willing quarians, and one of the nearby dextro wards has offered up a turian medic for a week.”

Then again, maybe she could.  Perhaps she would.  “That’s… good news,” Clare agreed,

“Indeed it is.  With six of us, we might even be able to work out some kind of roster.”

Six?  So that meant…

“I didn’t know what to think when you offered to help.  What motive could a human have, I wondered, that would make her do such a thing?  But I have watched you.  I see how you are with our patients.  You listen to them, you laugh at their jokes, you hold their hand when they’re in pain.  It is my turn to offer _you_ something.  I will teach you how to heal our patients.  The turians, mostly, as I’m sure you understand – if you would like to learn.”

“Rinna, thank you.  I want to learn.  I want to do whatever I can.”

“Then, good.  Meet me at bed eleven in five minutes.  There’s a turian with a shoulder burn and dressings that need changing.”

**

Heni'Zedor vas Zadolor and Kan'Nimma vas Maakor were a big help, especially to the injured quarians on the ward, and doubly so to Rinna.  She had been all but single handedly treating the quarians who came her way for a month, and suddenly she had more hands than she knew what to do with.

The turian medic, Voreana Caepraka, was as efficient and no nonsense as Clare would expect from the turian military.  She was a woman of few words, speaking only when necessary, and implemented several new processes in her time on the ward.  She even trained Clare briefly in a couple of small, turian centric practices that Rinna hadn’t been able to show her.  Like what to do with a broken leg spur, and how fringes really aren’t that flexible and need to be supported properly.  Clare was ashamed that it had taken her two weeks to work this out.

One day, one of their quarian patients; a woman Clare knew from their talks was a young mother of three, took a turn for the worse.  She had come in a few days previously after a piece of debris had torn the leg of her suit.  It was a nothing injury for anyone else, but for a quarian… Rinna had done everything right but though the infection was almost under control, the fever that consumed her body wasn’t responding well to the treatment.  Rinna pulled her aside,

“How is she doing?” Clare asked,

Rinna shook her head, “Zema'Sonna is… her body cannot sustain its fight against the fever.  We have done everything we can but I think it will not be long now.”

Clare chewed her lip, Zema’Sonna would be the first patient to actually die on her watch.  There had been a couple of close calls over the weeks, and a turian pilot who had died elsewhere, after being brought to them for triage before being moved on to a ward better equipped to deal with his injuries.  But the quarian, if she didn’t make it, would be the first of Clare’s patients to die and she wasn’t sure how to deal with it.

“Clare,” said Rinna, hesitating before placing an gloved hand on her arm, “if you need to take a break, it’s ok.”

Clare shook her head, “No, I want to be here.  I’ll stay with her.”

“I’ll be here.  Come find me when – if you need me.”

**

TERTIUS

Tertius saw the two women speaking, heads together, in hushed tones.  With their constant glances over to the wounded quarian in the corner, it wasn’t difficult to guess what they were saying.  He watched them break apart and on as Clare took up a seat next to the patient.  He saw her take up the woman’s hand and start speaking softly to her.  He couldn’t hear what she was saying, but the rise and fall of her voice was enough to reassure him from where he sat, and he knew the quarian was in good hands.

He watched them for a while, dividing his time between them and the datapad that made the rounds.  He was half way through reading the latest news when something changed.  He realised Clare had stopped speaking and he knew why even before he looked up.  He saw Clare place the quarian’s hand beside her on the bed before wiping at her eyes.  She sat there a few moments more, took a deep breath, and called for Rinna.  He looked away.

**

_His face was buried in her neck; his nose by her ear as he nuzzled his face against hers, mandibles fluttering.  She smiled, shivering at the feeling tickling her chin.  She turned her head to brush her mouth against his, kissing his plates with her lips.  Spirits, she was soft.  And warm.  He didn’t know a human could be so warm._

Tertius woke and slowly opened his eyes.  Staring at the ceiling, he prodded at the fragments of his dream he could remember.  He wasn’t surprised that he was dreaming of her.  He had heard many stories of wounded soldiers falling for the one who nursed them back to health.  They hadn’t been human, of course, but he couldn’t see that should make any difference.  And Clare was, well, Clare was easy to fall for.

Finally Tertius decided he was unconcerned about these feelings.  They were nothing he hadn’t dealt with before, and everyone had enough going on without complicating things further.  Because it would be complicated – even if she was willing.  There could be no one off encounter to blow off steam and help him move on.  He was wounded.  She had a duty of care to him.  And she was human to top it all off.  He wasn’t even sure how the two of them would even fit together and this wasn’t the time to start thinking about that.


	4. Week Four

CLARE

The new week brought with it a new recruit.  A new, human, recruit – a medic – by the name of John Cadance.  He must have been somewhere around her own age, but when he showed it, she found herself exhausted by his efforts.  He bounced around the ward like a puppy, too willing, too eager.  He gave off a certain charm, she supposed, a reassurance that he could solve all of your problems with a wave of his magic wand, but she had been solving her own problems for a while now and didn’t want anyone to take that away from her.

She glared at him out of narrow eyes even as she was checking Tertius’ bandages.  He followed her gaze,

“You’ve met the new medic, then?”

Clare glanced up at him and then back to her work, “I have.  He’s very… um…”

“Chipper?”

“ _Yes_ , that, my turian friend, is exactly the word I was looking for.”

Tertius snorted, “I could think of a few others.”

Clare fought a smile as she finished up, “So I take it you two are well acquainted.”

“We had a talk.  He suggested I begin physical therapy as soon as possible,”

As much as she loved his sarcastic drawl she didn’t understand it.  She frowned, “I mean, he’s probably got a point.”

His mandibles flared, “Oh, I wasn’t finished.  He suggested I start physical therapy with _that thing_.”

That thing was a blow up yoga ball resting inconspicuously in the corner of the room.  She almost burst out laughing at the image of him even sitting on one of those things.

“With all your spikes and whatnot, I think you’d burst the ball before you got any real benefit from it.”

Tertius hummed and seemed to consider his next words.  Clare waited patiently.

“When do you think I’ll be able to – start.  I can’t just sit in this bed forever, it’s damned uncomfortable for one.”

She smiled at his attempt to lighten his life altering question with humour, “I’ll have a talk to Rinna.  I’m sure we can have you up and walking in no time.”

**

TERTIUS

Clare stood, hands on hips, as she evaluated him.  Tertius was sat on the edge of his bed with his leg(s?) dangling over the edge and his hands on his thighs.  He was wearing a stupidly oversized white tshirt made for a human and adapted with the reckless use of scissors to accommodate his carapace.  His brow plates shifted and his mandibles flared in what he hoped was a reassuring expression.

“Right,” she said finally, “let’s start by getting you upright.  Maybe if you… hm… if I –“

“Clare,” and he something happened to her when he said her name.  The way his subvocals caught the word and strengthened it somehow.  She looked at him.  “Come over here.”  And she stepped over to his outstretched arm and let him close a hand around her shoulder.

“You sure about this?”

“Am I hurting you?”

“No.”

“I’m going to have to lean on you,”

She smiled, “I thought that was kind of the point.”

He hummed, “Right.  Just so you know, as a rule, turians are heavier than we look.”

Tertius pressed his right foot into the floor and leaned into her as he stood.  Her left arm went naturally around him to help him up.  He froze and she let him adjust to the sensation of standing on one leg.  She couldn’t know how it felt, her hand on the sensitive skin of his waist, with nothing but the flimsy cotton of the shirt between them.  Her hand shifted, moving over slightly to his middle, then back again, and he shut his eyes.  He did all he could to keep his subvocals in check but some sound must have escaped.  She brought her other hand around to rest on his keel bone, “Tertius?  You okay?”

He looked down at her, for the first time ever, taking in the way she looked at him and feeling how it undid something inside him – just a little bit.  He cleared his throat, “Yeah.  It’s –“ he looked away, maybe this was too much.  He found himself suddenly more frustrated then he’d been in weeks.  He huffed.  “I don’t know what to – _how_ to... How do I even begin?”  And he didn’t just mean his recovery, but she didn’t need to know that.  Because even though it had been weeks since everything had happened, they had been living in a bubble, focusing on nothing but getting through the day.  And now?  Now he had to take his first steps toward the wall of that bubble and he didn’t know if he was ready. 

Clare moved slowly to his other side, his wounded side.  “Use me,” she told him, and later he would swear his heart had stopped at her words, “that’s what I’m here for.  We’ll take one step, and another, and then another.  I’m going to get you through this.  _You’re going to get through this_ , and you’ll go home to Palaven, and I don’t know, find a girl and live your life.  But to do any of that, you’re gonna have to take that first step.”

So he stepped.  It’s not like she had left him much choice, after all.  He shuffled along, leaning into her all the way across the room and back again.  It wasn’t ideal, the height difference between them, but it got him out of bed – it got him closer to her.  Tertius knew he should be focusing on learning how to walk again but instead his mind decided to narrow in on every point where their bodies were touching.  His hip pressed into her side and he hoped he wasn’t hurting her.  He was pretty confident she would speak up if he was; one thing Clare wasn’t was quiet.  Their relationship was grounded in touches – from that first day when she had taken his hand it was a natural progression to where they were now.  The two of them were standing by his bed, his mandible was in her hair.

Wait.

His face was resting on the top of her head and his mandible fluttered against her temple.  Clare didn’t breathe, “Tertius?” she whispered, bunching the fabric at his side in her fist.  His subvocals hummed and he pulled back.  She opened her mouth to say more, and he hung on every potential word – especially if it was his name between her lips – but they were interrupted by the arrival of the new human medic.

“Hey guys!  How’re we doing over here?”

“Uh - fine,” she told him,

“Just, getting a start on that physical therapy, doc.”

Cadance nodded, “Great, great.  It’s good to see you up on your feet, big guy.”

Cadance clapped him on the shoulder.  Tertius fixed him with his best turian stare.  Clare coughed and looked away but Tertius could feel the way he shoulders shook with supressed laughter.

“Foot,” Tertius corrected,

“What’s that?”

Tertius heard Clare exhale slowly through her nose, “I’ve only got the one, as you may have noticed.”

Cadance gave him the most condescending smile imaginable, “Sorry, old human saying.  It’s good to see you up and about.  And hey, if you feel up to it, maybe we can try out the yoga ball later on.”

Tertius growled and Cadance excused himself with some lame excuse.  Tertius sat back on his bed and grinned at her, mandibles flicking.

“That was mean,” she said, grinning right back at him,

“No, Clare, that was fun.”

**

CLARE

Was she just supposed to ignore that – whatever it was?  Clare would be the first to admit her limited knowledge of turian customs, but she was pretty damned sure that wasn’t turian for hello.  Then again, maybe it was some kind of gratitude thing.  Right.  It had felt nice though, like a natural progression in their relationship.  Too late Clare realised that, tangled up in her love for her job, her love of helping people and actually being useful for once in her life, were feelings for him.  For Tertius.  Feelings that were, apparently, so foreign to her that she didn’t even know them when she felt them.  She was on her way to her shared accomodation, when she realised, stopping dead on the road where she was walking.  “Oh.” She said aloud, “ _Oh._ ” She said again when she thought about what that meant.

_He was on top of her on the couch.  His talons traced tantalising lines up and down the backs of her thighs.  His tongue was everywhere.  Her neck, her clavicle, her chest.  Every now and then his plates came together to nip at her skin.  Then things started to get interesting, his large hand came smoothing over her hip bone and his mouth eventually joined it.  She moved her hips against his mouth, pressing herself into him.  She felt his teeth on her skin, just for a second, and ran her fingers under his fringe in encouragement._

Clare woke and looked at the time.  Still three hours before she needed to be back on the ward.  To Hell with it.  It was time to do some research.  She settled in bed with her datapad.  She began by searching turian anatomy just to get some kind of grounding – plus, she reasoned, this counted as research for her job.  If she, you know, decided to chicken out of this whole thing and hadn’t fallen too far down the rabbit hole.  It wasn’t long before she had found various articles entitled things like, “So You’re Dating A Turian” and “Chirality And You – What You Need To Know Before Exchanging Fluids”.

The rabbit hole was fathomless.  Over an hour later she opened a vid, curiosity piqued by the Mature Content Warning, and watched a male turian run a hand over the seam of the plates between his legs.  Before she really knew what she was watching, she saw the plates loosen and shift and then, seemingly out of nowhere, he was holding a very stiff, very blue, very turian penis.  She put datapad down.  Huh.

**


	5. Week Five

CLARE

When she walked back onto the ward, she found several beds surrounded by portable modesty screens.

“What’s going on?” she asked Heni,

“Final examinations before discharge.  The ward’s going to be rather empty after today.”

Clare looked around.  When she had first found the ward over a month ago, almost every bed had been filled.  On bad days, they even had a patient or two sitting on the floor.  Now though, the serious injuries had been dealt with – either healing up, or taking the lives of the wounded – and they were left with the stragglers and minor injuries obtained from clean up duty. 

“We’re not closing, are we?”

Heni shrugged, “I shouldn’t think it will be long now.”

Clare wondered what she would do.

She walked over to Tertius’ bed and pulled back the screen.  He was naked on the bed, hands folded across his middle, eyes closed.  She couldn’t look away.

“See anything you like?”

**

TERTIUS

He heard her speaking to Heni at the other end of the room.  Her voice was so much higher pitched, so much more lilting than the quarian’s.  He enjoyed listening to it, and felt his subvocals hum with contentment.

Footsteps, now, he heard her approaching.  Would it shock her to see him laid out like this?  His mandibles flared knowing it would.  Humans and their modesty.  But there was something else, too, curling inside him.  He wanted her to see him, all of him, he wanted her to know first hand what he was – and by extension, everything he wasn’t.  He knew he looked nothing like the men she was used to.  His body that was so familiar to him was completely alien to her.  He wanted her to go in with her eyes open.  He wanted her to want him.

He heard the screen being pulled back.  He heard her footsteps falter and then stop.  He felt her stare and willed himself to stay still.

“See anything you like?”

Clare let out her breath in a rush, “Wow, yeah, okay, this is _not_ how I thought this was going to go.”

What?

“I guess, since you’re asking, the short answer is yes.”

What?  She couldn’t possibly.  He opened his eyes and flailed in an effort to sit up.

“ _Yes_ , what?”

“ _Yes_ , I see something I like.”  The corners of her mouth twitched and she failed to supress a smile.

How, in the name of all of the _Spirits of Palaven_ , did she manage to gain the upper hand?  Oh, _right_ , he was lying naked in front of her like an idiot.  He couldn’t believe that _this_ is the plan he went with.  And more than that, that it appeared to be working.  And if _this_ was working?  Maybe she did really like him after all.  He dragged himself up to sit on the edge of the bed, “What?” his voice was rough, and the way his subvocals picked up on the word made it sound harsher than ever.

Clare sat down next to the bed.  “I like you,” she told him simply, “I’m so glad your leg is healing up, we’ve all worked bloody hard to get you here, but I’m going to miss you.  It might be selfish to say it, but you’ve been there with me through all of this, and I know it wasn’t by choice.  You’ve helped me a lot and I don’t want to stop seeing you every day.”

He didn’t have words for what he wanted to say.  His subvocals were vibrating, telling her how much she’d helped him and that he would miss her, too, but of course she couldn’t know what he meant.  He put a hand on her shoulder and she pressed her face against his leathery skin.  His heart swelled.  His mandibles fluttered.  Okay, maybe she did know.

“Good, so, you’re not pulling away in disgust or anything; which I think means we’re on the same page.  I mean, you might actually have to use your words every now and then, but this is a good start.”

He hummed his amusement.  His agreement.  His total disbelief that she had just said what she said.  She grabbed his hand and stood up to face him, with him seated on the edge of the bed, they were almost the same height.  She held his hand to her chest, rested a hand lightly on his bad thigh, and pressed her lips to his brow.

His free hand pinned hers to his thigh and he slid his face forward to nuzzle in the crook of her neck.  She returned the gesture.

**

CLARE

Once the patients were discharged, Clare wandered over to Rinna’s desk.

“Did you get your goodbye with your turian?”

And, not for the first time, Clare wondered just who Rinna had been before all this.  The woman hardly looked up from her work, hardly slept, yet she always knew exactly what was going on.

“I did.  Did you hear all that?”

“I did.”

“And?  Do you think we’re making a mistake?”

“It’s not my place - and that doesn’t mean I don’t approve, _nehya_.  You’re young, and intelligent, and resourceful – and you deserve happiness.  Both of you.  It will be difficult but if you can give that to one another, for however long, maybe it’s worth it.”

Clare nodded, “Thank you.  I respect you and it means a lot to hear you say that.”

“And now, my girl?  What will the closure of the ward mean for you?”

“Closure?  But we still have patients.”

Rinna shook her head, “Minor injuries.  A broken finger here, a cut there.  We’re restructuring, moving everything to a more central location with the – with your people.”

Clare tried to take everything in.  Her immediate thought was to follow Rinna, wherever she ended up, but she had other things to consider.  The immediate need for medical help was over, they were finally getting through the backlog.  Rinna considered her, “Take the rest of the week,” she told her, “go home, find your people, find your young man.  Think about it.  I’ll be around.”

“Thank you.  I will.”

“Now go.  If you leave now, you might catch them up.”

Clare didn’t need to ask who she meant.  She swore she could see the older woman smiling; she smiled back.


	6. Epilogue

** TEN WEEKS ON **

CLARE

She was sat on the edge of the bed, watching him with interest as he started to undress.  She had seen him take his clothes off several times by now, but she hadn’t ever really paid that much attention to the process.  She was watching now, though, as he rested on a crutch and only kind of lopsidedly unclasped his tunic.

“So how do you get in and out of those things, anyway?”

His brow plates shifted, and he glanced only briefly at her before continuing – and was it her imagination, or was he going more slowly now?

“What do you mean?”

“With all of your…” and she trailed off, gesturing in swoops and spikes with her hands.

Tertius hummed his amusement and shrugged off his shirt, “Well, these are actually made for turians.  I imagine it was much more amusing watching me struggle out of those other things you had me wearing.”

She grinned, remembering the first time he had tried to get out of a tshirt by himself.

“I thought as much.”

Clare stood and walked over to him, and put her hands on his waist to study the strange clasps at the front of his trousers.  Her smile lingered.  She loved the noises he made, the heat of him under her hands, the way his body shifted subtly, bringing him closer – as close as he could get leaning on a crutch.  He looked down at her, fixing her with an even look, “The turians have a saying,” he told her slowly, “don’t start something you aren’t going to finish.”

She laughed, “Yes, humans have that one, too.  And I intend to finish what I started, just as soon as I figure out what on Earth is going on here.”

It all looked like too much hassle to go through, too many clasps and extra swathes of material.  Dimly she thought that maybe this was why you mostly saw turians in armour.  Less hassle.

Then his big, warm hands were moving over hers, showing her what to do.  When he spoke, his breath stirred her hair and his voice was so low that she almost felt the vibrations of his subvocals more than she heard the words.  They were unimportant anyway.  “Start with this one here,” he told her, simultaneously pressing a clasp and pulling the band of material in the opposite direction, “then this…” and so on and so forth until the top of his trousers was lying open and flapping around his hips.

She couldn’t resist.  The second his skin was revealed, she put her hands back on his waist; his soft, unguarded waist.  Her fingers acted of their own accord, and ghosted over the pebbly cobble of plates that ran down inside his trousers.  Tertius groaned and moved almost completely off balance.  His subvocals continued to thrum even as he caught himself.

“Shall we?” she asked,

His mandibles flared, “I’ll be on my back in a minute, either way,” he told her wryly,

“Are you propositioning me?”

Tertius inclined his head, “Is it working?  Or are you just taking pity on a poor, crippled turian?”

“Oh, it’s definitely working.”

He limped over and fell back onto the bed, “Hang on, I thought you were the one propositioning me.”

Clare laid down next to him and pressed herself against his side, a lazy smile on her lips, “Is it working?”

Tertius brought an arm around her and moved his fingers over the dip of her waist, “Spirits, what did I do before you?”

The thrumming in his chest kicked up a notch and she wished, not for the first time and only briefly, that she were turian so she could know exactly what he meant and return in kind.  Her hand skimmed over his torso to rest above his keel.  Clare pulled herself up onto her elbow to look over him; she put her forehead to his.

“I wish I could hum like that,” she told him, her eyes darting between his, “I wish I could show you how I feel like another turian could.”

Tertius reached up to cup her cheek, “You don’t need subvocals when you have a face as transparent as yours.  I haven’t had to wonder about your feelings for a while now,”  Clare wanted to be indignant but she knew it was true, and for once, having all her feelings show on her face was coming in handy, “but it’s always nice to have you say it, whether it’s through words or… other means.”

She nuzzled his face, smushing her nose up against his.

“There you go,” he told her, reassuring her,

“I love you,” she said, whispering into his mandible; it fluttered against her lips.  “That’s all I’ve got, Tertius.  That’s all the bloody English language has to tell you how I feel about you.  I really, _really_ love you.”

**

Clare got up to shower shortly afterward, and under the hot water she remembered their first time together.  Not the first time they had had sex, that came later, but their first time together as two regular people; it wasn’t even a date as such, but it was their first shared experience of no distractions, no interruptions, and no strange carer dynamic.  Though of course, there would always be a little of that.

She remembered ghosting her fingertips over his mouth plates, and the way his mandibles felt between her thumb and forefinger, how his markings caught the light and played in her shadow as she traced them.  She remembered following the cracks in his plates with her eyes, then her fingers, then her mouth, and running a hand back over his fringe and under along the thicker hide at the back of his head.  And that was only for starters.

They didn’t even get undressed, that first time.  Hell, they didn’t even make it much below the neck.

Once she was done, or more to the point, when he couldn’t sit still any longer, it was her turn under his touch.  He ran the back of his talons through her hair and there was something in the way he did it that made her think that maybe he’d been wanting to do that for a while.  She leaned into his touch and smiled as his hand came around to cradle the back of her neck.  He had put his forehead to hers, then, and smoothed his mouth across her brow.  Whether it was a turian thing, a Tertius thing, or a safety thing, he mostly used his face, nuzzling her.  He slid their noses past one another, pressed their cheeks together, and she knows she was smiling when his mandible fluttered against her skin.

She had grabbed his face and pressed her lips to his mouth.  She knew then, as she does now, that the two of them would never _really_ kiss, and sometimes she misses it, but no one else – no human – would press his face into the hollow of her neck and _purr_ like Tertius does.

TERTIUS

Clare was looking at him; he could see her from over the doctor’s shoulder.  The doctor was saying something, explaining the ins and outs of his new prosthetic, the one he’d been waiting for for months, and he knew he should have been paying attention.  But her voice didn’t hold his attention like Clare’s did.  Her eyes weren’t shining, there was no smile tucked away at the corner of her mouth, her face wasn’t open and beaming at him like Clare’s was.

Tertius wasn’t sure how this had become his life.  One day he was on a ship bound for Earth, no where near ready to face the Reapers, but ready to do his duty, ready to lay down his life if necessary to get the job done.  As it turned out, all it had required of him was his leg.  And for that sacrifice he had been rewarded with Clare.  Only a few short months had past and they were practically living together.  He was living on a cold, alien planet with his warm, alien girlfriend and now he was being fitted for an artificial limb.

Clare frowned slightly and cocked her head, and it was only then that he realised his subvocals were singing to her.  That she could hear him.  That maybe she was starting to understand him.  He couldn’t blush like she did, _spirits, no one could blush like she did_ , but he did return his attention to the doctor in front of him.

“So, Mr Adratius, are you ready to try this thing on?”

“Definitely,” he told her.

The doctor got up from her seat and moved to kneel in front of him.  He did his best to ignore the smirk on Clare’s mouth.  He coughed.

“Okay, so you’re going to want to put on one of these socks first,” the doctor said, pulling the said material over the end of his leg, “and then you can go ahead and attach the leg like this.”  She demonstrated the clip mechanisms, similar enough to those found on turian clothing to be familiar.  “And you’re good to go!”

Tertius looked down at his new knee, flexing the joint ever so slightly, “Just like that?”

The doctor smiled, “Just like that.”

Tertius shook his head slowly, processing. 

“I know.  It’ll take a while to get used to the idea of it, and to walking with it, but the technology has really come along in the last decade or so.  And this latest batch has been designed especially for turian soldiers.  Fully engineered by turians here on planet – with human support, of course.”

Tertius nodded, “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.  Now, in your own time, you can try standing.  Whenever you’re ready.”

Tertius took one last breath and pushed himself up off the table and onto his feet.  He transferred his weight gingerly to his prosthetic.  His mandibles flared in pleasant surprise.  He bounced cautiously on the spot.  He could feel Clare’s eyes on him.  He glanced up at her to see her grinning stupidly at him.

He realised he was nervous about her reaction, “What do you think?”

“I think you should come over here and ask me,”

His brow plates shifted and he looked to the doctor, who nodded.  He took a tentative step forward.  Then another, and another.  The prosthetic made odd, quiet hydraulic sounding noises with each step.  His gait had a definite shuffling quality to it, but he was walking on two feet again.  Once he had crossed the room to where Clare was sitting, he offered her his hand.  She took it and stood in front of him.

“I think it’s wonderful,” she told him, wrapping her arms around him.

He nuzzled his face into her hair, “Thank you for getting me here.”


End file.
